


Beauty Is…

by mcgarrygirl78



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Drama, F/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-08
Updated: 2014-10-08
Packaged: 2018-02-20 08:15:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2421614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcgarrygirl78/pseuds/mcgarrygirl78
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She wasn’t a young starling anymore, she was a mature swan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beauty Is…

**Author's Note:**

> This story is based on [one of the most beautiful pictures of Jayne Atkinson I've ever seen](http://rogovoyreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Jayne-Atkinson.jpg). And the first thing I thought of when I saw it was that there was finally a representation of how the Dave in my head sees the Erin in my head.

“Hey baby, what are you doing?” Dave walked into the bathroom. “You’ve been in here for a while.”

“I'm looking at myself.” Erin replied.

“And a very beautiful self it is.”

He stood behind her as Erin stood in front of the mirror. Dave wrapped his arms around her, kissing her shoulder. It was bedtime and he’d done plenty of things to get ready while Erin remained in the bathroom. Something wasn’t right; he could feel it under her skin. Dave didn’t know what to make of it.

It was an average day, nothing good or bad happened. They worked late, grabbed a late Thai dinner, and then just went home. They walked the dog together before calling it a night. That was almost an hour ago.

“You're sweet sometimes.”

“What's the matter?”

“When you look at me, David, what do you see?”

“The woman I love.” he said.

“What else do you see? Look at me, in this mirror right now and tell me what you see.”

“I see a woman. I see a blonde with piercing blue eyes. I see soft skin and a black nightgown. You wanna give me a hint…what am I looking for?”

“I have lines around my eyes.” Erin replied.

“OK.”

“I have lines around my eyes and on my forehead. My neck is a mess.”

“What's wrong with your neck?” Dave asked.

“Things are starting to sag; they're sagging all over.”

“Erin…”

“Don’t deny it. Please for the love of God, do not give me the ‘you're beautiful’ rhetoric.”

“The last time I checked it wasn’t rhetoric.”

Dave moved from behind her and leaned on the counter beside her. He really looked at her. She wasn’t wearing a stitch of makeup because it was bedtime. He would be lying to himself, and her, and if he told her she looked like a 25 year old woman. But she didn’t look over 50, which she was.

She looked fantastic. Sure, she had lines; most women her age did. But they didn’t diminish her beauty, they enhanced it. Erin Strauss had been on a journey. She wasn’t a young starling anymore, she was a mature swan.

He loved her neck, her throat, her chin, and her cheekbones. He loved her eyes, especially how they looked when she let him love her. He liked her without makeup, natural and beautiful. He loved when she first woke up in the morning when she was drowsy and sometimes confused.

He never minded her ice packs to reduce puffiness, cucumbers over her eyes, and her nightly rituals. Dave wasn’t sure if those things worked or didn’t. It didn’t matter…she was beautiful. He never lied when he told her that and he surely wasn’t the only man who thought so.

“You know who men your age can aspire to be?” she asked.

“No.”

“Jack Nicholson.”

“I've never been a huge fan, but OK.”

“He's still the man. He still gets the girl and the top billing and the badass label.”

“If you say so.”

“You know who women my age can look up to?”

“Who?”

“No one. We’re just trying to keep up. There are a few women in their 40s who are still considered beautiful. What comes after that, David?”

“Jessica Lange.” He replied. “Jessica Lange comes after that. Meryl Streep, Catherine Deneuve, Helen Mirren, Glenn Close, and Anne Archer. Now I can't use my hot blonde analogy, Anne Archer kinda ruined it but she is a beautiful woman. Jack Nicholson might want to spend an hour and forty minutes chasing around some woman a third his age and making an ass of himself. I like my women to be women.”

“What does that even mean?” Erin looked away from the mirror and looked at him.

“It means when I tell you that you're beautiful, it’s never rhetoric. I love your face, your body, your soul, your mind, every damn thing about you. You, Erin Strauss, you, right here right now are fuckin beautiful. You turn me on. You make me crazy with desire. You did at 25; you will at 55.”

“So I shouldn’t get Botox?”

“Absolutely not. If you do that I would…” Dave sighed.

He didn’t want to say he would never forgive her. She had a right to want to do whatever she pleased. But once you started with that kind of thing when it fell, it fell harder. She would have to get more and more just to look like she did the first time.

That look would never be achieved again. Plastic surgery, or whatever the hell it was, was as addictive as any drug out there. He refused to let the woman he loved become an addict. While Dave didn’t know what to do to stop her, he still refused.

“Nancy got Botox.” Erin said. “She looks fantastic.”

“No offense, but Nancy was never as beautiful as you are. Not that I think she needed Botox either but you're comparing apples and oranges. You're comparing Farrah Fawcett to Carol Brady.”

“Don’t be silly…we don’t look that different.”

“Yes, you do. You do to me anyway. But I realize this is about how you feel about yourself. I could talk until I'm blue in the face but you're going to believe what you believe.”

“I asked for your opinion.” She replied.

“Well you got it. Don’t do that to yourself.”

Erin nodded. She walked out of the bathroom, turning off the light as she went. Dave stood in the dark for a few moments before following her into the bedroom.

“I don’t want to be shallow.” She said, turning down the bed sheets and crawling over his side to get to hers. “But I don’t want to be old either.”

“You could go for the alternative.” Dave got into bed as well. “But I’d miss you terribly.”

“This is stupid.” Erin let out a sound of exasperation as they settled into bed and Mudgie joined them. “Let’s just stop, alright.”

“Yeah.” he nodded, reaching to turn out the lamp.

For a while they just lie in the darkness. She was on her side of the bed and Dave was on his. It wasn’t often that they took this long to get to each other’s arms. Maybe it was going to be one of those nights. He usually liked a little warning before they had one of those nights.

It wasn’t that he needed to get laid. Still Dave thought, and he had for most of the night, that they’d already be halfway through the first act by now. It wasn’t just about the sex…he wanted her close. He wanted her naked.

How could she think she wasn’t beautiful? That’s what concerned him the most. Dave moved onto his side, sliding closer to her. Erin sighed when he kissed her neck.

“You're still the most beautiful girl I know.” He whispered. “Nothing will change that. I don’t need to be Jack Nicholson; I like being David Rossi. I like you being Erin Strauss.”

“You don’t want me to be Anne Archer?” she asked.

“I would prefer that then chasing after something that doesn’t make any sense. You earned your age. You earned your beauty. You wear it well.”

“You're not too shabby yourself, Agent Rossi.” Erin turned too, exhaling as she cuddled in his arms.

“If you think you need something like that, Erin, I know I won't be able to talk you out of it. There’s much more I could probably say but in the end that’s the only truth.”

“It just seems sometimes as if everyone around me is getting younger.” She replied.

Everyone around him was getting younger as well. She loved David so much. Erin had let go of the past and looked forward to their future together. But she still worried. He loved women, being with her didn’t change that.

He would always appreciate a beautiful one. Someday soon would more than his eyes wander? Were his eyes even wandering now? This wasn’t just about him but it was hard getting older and knowing he could leave right now and have a thirty year old. She didn’t have that twisted privilege and sometimes it got her in the gut.

“Everyone around me is getting more muscular.” Dave said. “We’re getting older, as I said, but it beats the alternative. We’re luckier than a lot of people.”

“Why?”

“We’re lucky because we get to do it together. Everything that drops on you will drop on me; and it'll happen to me first. We’ll keep each other young at heart. I'm never going to think of you as anything but my baby. And you’re always going to find me ridiculously sexy and handsome.”

Erin laughed, hugging him. She kissed him and liked it so much she did it again.

“You are handsome. You are sexy.” she said.

“You're sexy, baby. I wouldn’t say it if it weren't true. But more important than all of that, I want you to feel good about yourself. If this Botox makes you feel good then I’ll keep my mouth shut about it. I don’t like it but I don’t have to live in your body. I only worship it.”

“We’ll stop talking about it for now. It was a long day and I want to end it. Tell me that you love me.”

“I love you.” Dave kissed her.

“I love you too.”

Erin held onto him as she tried to fall asleep. She didn’t know what she was going to do and she hated that this insecurity attacked her in the first place. She’d never been one of those women…now was a bad time to start. With some things it was hard to get control of the ball once it started rolling down the hill.

Erin would probably look in the mirror a lot over the next week or so. She would decide on Botox or something, change her mind, and probably decide on it again. The end of this story was one she didn’t know. Actually, the end of this chapter was one she didn’t know. She was pretty hopeful the story ended with ‘and they all lived happily ever after’.

***

  



End file.
